Sunday, May 13, 2007

The Game Plan 2007

Well, Mayday and the Vimy game are over (for now)…. so what am I going to do for the rest of the year…

I’m going to break this down into three sections:ConventionsRegular GamingProjects

CONVENTIONS

I had a great time at Mayday. I’ll definitely be going back next year.

It saddens me somewhat that I have to spend a couple hundred dollars and travel 600km to get in a couple good games over a weekend. But I guess that’s the way it is. Conventions also give me a very tangible deadline for the completion of projects. So I’m going to keep going to them. I’d like to go to more, maybe some bigger ones out east down in the states – anybody out there got any recommendations?

Fallcon, Calgary, AB

I had a pretty good time at Fallcon last year too so I think I’ll be going back to that again this year. This year I think I’d like to run a couple games:

One would be a Contemptible Little Armies game set in the Back of Beyond. The scenario I have in mind would be set in China in the early 1920's and involve a walled city that four separate armies (White Russian, Bolshevik, British/Indian, and Chinese Warlord - plus the defenders of the city makes five, I guess) are trying to take or loot, or prevent others from taking or looting, for their own personal reasons, perhaps with some sub-plots/alternate victory conditions for each.

The other would be a Savage Worlds skirmish game. This would probably be a Pulp Adventure game of some sort like I’ve been running a lot of lately. I’d like to say I’d do a Pirates game but, while I AM a highly productive hobbyist, I wouldn’t want to saddle myself with completing two big projects by then…

Hero’s Gambit, Saskatoon, SK

Last year was a LOT of work getting all the games ready and brow-beating people into showing up to play them and/or run a couple…and for what? I got in a couple of games over a weekend, mostly with guys that I could game with anytime (with the exception of John and Chris – who both made out for a game or two). They were all great games, but I was EXHAUSTED by the end of the weekend!

I’m thinking maybe I’ll just do stuff Friday night and Saturday only… Four games, I could run two and I’ll get someone else to run two. For myself I’ll, again, probably run a Savage Worlds skirmish game of some sort and a Contemptible Little Armies game. The Contemptible Little Armies game would probably be based on one of the Canadians attacks at Passchendale. The Savage Worlds… well we’ll see where I’m at when the event submission deadline comes up at the end of July. It could be a Pulp Adventure or maybe It’ll be a Pirates of the Spanish Main tabeltop adventure!

Tim’s Miniature Wargaming Campaign Weekend

I’d also like to start an annual (or semi-annual?!) wargaming campaign weekend. This would be like a mini-convention were we get together and play games all weekend long, except all the games would be part of a single campaign. Ideally it could potentially involve a number of people and have some aspect of strategic and/or political maneuvering with the enemy and even friction between commanders on the same side. For the tabletop aspect I imagine I would provide all the armies, terrain, etc. needed and use rules that are familiar to all or quite simple and easy to pick up. Hopefully this would all be cool enough to draw friends new and old, local or out-of-towners to my place for a weekend of miniature wargaming madness.

I have a couple ideas for potential campaigns so far; a Contemptible Little Armies/Back of Beyond Campaign and a DBA 1066 campaign. Both are detailed a bit more below. Of course I’m open to other suggestions….

"Race for Kashgar" CLA/Back of Beyond weekend –

Well as I mentioned I should have four armies by Fallcon and could potentially accommodate up to six armies (requiring three tables; one in the war room, two in the garage - which will be heated by next fall!). So two others could bring their own armies.

So far I’m thinking this would probably be something very similar to the campaign in the book. All the armies (and characters…?) would start at a set number of abstract “steps” from Kashgar; their ultimate goal (maybe four steps, rather than the TEN or so suggested in the book for an ongoing campaign). I’d probably have to spice it up with some sub-plots and what not…

I could also allow players to play “characters” and thus accommodate a few more players – though I’d have to come up with some more interesting characters than those in the book so they’d have a bit more to DO! Some more important way of affecting the tabletop battles and a ways to actively participate in them.

I imagine there’d be 6 games: Friday Night, Saturday Morning, Saturday Afternoon, Saturday Night, Sunday Morning, Sunday Afternoon. There is a mechanism in the Campaign system whereby you can send your army on a forced march and not participate in one game if anyone wanted to give one of the slots a miss.

Closest army/character to Kashgar at the end of Sunday afternoon is the winnah! Perhaps if two armies were equidistant from the city (or AT the city) they could fight each other to see who gets into Kashgar first – which would be a walled city defended by a small force of Chinese… Maybe if somebody rocked their first couple of games and got to Kashgar well before the final games they could have to try and hold it against other armies that arrive later…?

I’m not sure when I would run it just yet though. Would long weekends be best or not long weekends (because people do things with family on long-weekends)? Thanksgiving weekend? labour day? If it’s not on a long weekend anyone coming from out of town would have to take one or more days off… well It would be like a vacation – well it would be for me! – and that’s what vacation days are for, right?!

Ideally late August/early September would be grand. That would be about half a year from my birthday – which is when I would hold another one (if I wanted to do this semi-annually – turn my annual Wargaming Birthday Bash into a Wargaming Birthday Bash WEEEKEND!). Later in September is Fallcon. The weekend after thanksgiving is Hero’s Gambit.

I’m thinking I might charge an entry fee. Not to make money or anything, mostly to buy some fun prizes for something or other. It would also be a sneaky way of forcing people to make some sort of tangible commitment to coming. I find that things one has to sign up for but are free are much easier to simply not show up to than things that you’ve actually paid something for, even if it is just five or ten dollars…

DBA 1066 Campaign

This is one I’ve been wanting to do for years. I have all the armies in 15mm (Anglo-Danish, Normans, Welsh, Irish, Scotts and Vikings – I also think I have enough for a second West Frankish and maybe a second Viking…). I’d just have to finish painting a few of them. The campaign would be very simple and more or less based on the one presented in the book – with a few tweaks.

REGULAR GAMIN’

Savage SundaysI’d like to have some regular Savage Worlds games run on Sunday afternoons. This will probably end up being every second Sunday or the first and third, etc. The alternate Sundays would be “hobby days” were I can get some painting and sculpting and terrain building in.

As long as I’m still running 20s/30s pulp adventure games I might work some CLA into the Sunday games. I’ve been thinking of using it as a even faster, more furious, and still fun way of resolving mass combats for Savage Worlds set in the early twentieth century.

Pirates of the Spanish Main has shipped to distributors, however, and should be here within a week or two. I may just have to run some Savaged Pirate games… I’ve also recently watched the Deadwood series and that’s given me a hankerin to murder some little metal c@ck-s*ckers… maybe Deadlands: Reloaded -style

Friday Night WargamesI’d like to revive the Friday Night Wargames. Part of me wants to just run a game every Friday night. If you run it, they will come, right….? The sensible part of me thinks I should just run a game once a month – others can run games on the other Fridays…? Or maybe the Friday’s would be “hobby nights”.

PROJECTS

I do like to try and stay focused on one (maybe two..) projects at a time as I am way more productive that way. I don’t find it easy all the time, as I am so interested in so many things. For the balance of this year I’d like to stick with the early twentieth century and the Contemptible Little Armies rules but shift my focus a bit to the east and into the years following the Great War – The Back of Beyond.

I have three armies well on their way, and a couple others started. The four I will be focusing on for the next couple months to try and finish up – or at least finish up enough for some big convention/campaign games. These armies are: White Russian, Bolsheviks, Chinese Warlord, and British/Indian.

Here’s what I’m thinking my initial CLA/BoB Armies will consist of:

White Russians

6 Units of Regular Infantry (with bombs) 18 men each (I have 4 units complete, one in progress on the painting table and a sixth cast waiting on deck – in a small box very near the painting table - the rank and file are cast by myself using a mould made by my friend John Bertolini, the officers, so far, are from Coppelstone Castings others will be made by converting some of my own officer figures)

1 Units of Cossak Cavalry 16 men (I have the cavalrymen cast and the horses – from Hinchliffe)

Other options I’d like to add in the future include.... Armoured Cars or Tanks, British Allies(!? Well I have british – I could include them at any time…), unit of Officer Volunteers (might get some pretty Coppelstone figures for this – just to make them stand out from the rest of the rabble), Field Gun(s)(either Battle Honours or just buy another Reviresco british 4.5 inch QF howitzer and use my own generic gunners), Off table artillery

6 Regular Chinese infantry units (a brigade or two regiments, each containing 3 battalions): 18 each (17 of my infantrymen + one officer either Coppelstone or my own converted from … something else.. my German officer perhaps?) ( I have half of these units complete and enough cast for the rest… I think…)

1 Airplane: 1/48 French Spad (assembled and in the process of being painted – need to make a flight stand.. he kit is from Testors)

1 Executioner (DONE! - Coppelstone)

So all I really need to do is finish that plane and paint up three more units of infantrymen.

Other options I’d like to add in the future include.... an FT-17 tank, Dare-to-Die fanatics (they look fun) and/or White Russian Mercenaries (I could always use the whites I own if someone else actually showed up with their own damn army), an Armoured car.... MORE CAVALRY(when I get around to modeling a horse of my own)!!!

British/India

2 Units of British Infantry: 16 men, 15 marksmen + 1 LMG (I have two units of British infantrymen completed – they’re of an older homemade figure and only 13 per unit – I have since remastered my British infantry in tropical dress and so I’ll just cast and paint up two fresh units at some point…)

2 Units of Indian Infantry: 16 men, 15 regulars + 1 LMG (These I still need to model – a project for this summer!)

1 HMG (DONE! Battle Honours – I have a second crew on the move primed…)

Other options I’d like to add in the future include.... a higher ratio of Indian Infantry, CAVALRY!!!! Sniper, Aritllery….

Bolsheviks

I haven’t quite figured out what I’m going to do for these just yet. To start with it will be a pretty infantry heavy army. Like maybe 9 units! I am just about finished four Bolshevik masters (officer, 2 riflemen, lewis-gunner – all in budonovka and great coats) I’d like to add some HMGs (probably Old Glory WW1 Russian HMG teams in winter dress), commisars (Coppelstone), a sniper(?), and a field gun (again either Battle Honours or Reviresco gun with my own crew). I also have an extra 1:48 SPAD that I thought I’d paint up with Bolshevik markings. I’ll add cavalry at some point in the future (when I get around to sculpting my own horse!)

Other projects to work on…

Pirates

As mentioned before, with the Pirates of the Spanish Main book coming out I’m sure I will be picking it up and at some point running some pirate games on Savage Sunday’sI actually have quite a few pirates already; some are painted, most are not.

Most of the painted ones are my old Mordhiem Pirate warband: the all-woman crew of the Red Snapper. I have quite a few old RAFM jack Tar sailor and marines and a few Wargames Foundry cutthroats. I’d have a bit of painting to finish them all up.

The bigger part of the project would be making a few ships! I’d like to make a number of small scale vessels for strategic ship battles and a couple of bigger scale ships to use with my 28mm figures for boarding actions and the like.

The small ships would be simple and stylized and carved or cut out of wood or MDF with round toothpicks for masts. I just can’t bring myself to buy into a collectable card game or play with cardboard ships….

The bigger ship would also be scratch build jobbies of scrap wood and/or MDF, with doweling for masts, string for rigging and old fabric from worn out shirts and the like for sails.

Wild West (or deadlands weird wild west…?) All I’d have to do for this is make a couple of simple buildings and finish up a few figures. I have a fair number of old west figures from waaaaaaaay back. I recently rebased them for a game I ran last fall.

Pulp Adventure/WW2

I’m pretty happy with what I’ve got right now. I have a load of figures to paint up – I know there’s some zeppelin crew, and other odd assorted figures purchased over the last year of so. Mostly I’d like to build some more props and sets – furniture for my buildings, some more buildings (a mansion, a hangar, maybe some modern – as in 1920s modern – urban buildings…?) a zeppelin, maybe some other Airships,

East (Central?) Africa

Got kind of stoked about this… well I still am… but it’s probably going to have to wait. I have modeled a King’s African Rifles figure and a German East African Shutztruppe Askari figure and cast and painted up a unit of each. I’d need to do loads more though. It might be a next year project in the end.

I bought a pile of 1/72 Great War airplanes last December. I was totally stoked about setting up for running some Canvas Eagles games. I still am but other things seem to have taken priority.

So far I have painted up an old SPAD I have picked up, assembled and primed years ago. I’ve also made a flight stand or two and printed of the rules. I have a dozen planes to build and paint. I also have to make some more flight stands and a hex map sheet to play on.

I’ve had a hankering to do some naval wargaming – something slightly more modern than age of sail – but not so modern that turns take hours to play out seconds due to the complexity of what’s going on. Since I’m interested in the Great War on land (CLA) and in the air (Canvas Eagles) – playing the Great War era at sea seems an obvious choice. I had looked at Phill Barker’s set of simple Pre-dreadnaught naval rules DBsA. Not knowing anything about naval warfare, period, let alone anything specific about Great War ships I felt a little daunted by not having a clue which of the RNs “cruisers” in the Public Library’s copy of Jane’s fell into Phil’s neat little categorys of 1st, 2nd, and 3rd class cruisers…. I have since returned to the rules with the thought; “who cares?!” I’m just going to make my own little, very generic looking, ships. One for each class in the game. All 1st class ships from all nations will look identical – to tell them apart I will make wee flags and maybe mark a name on the base – not necessarily an historical name either…!

This project really is in it’s infancy as I have not even read all the way through the rules or begun to design, let alone BUILD, any ships. But it’d be nice to do someday… maybe it should have been in the next category or projects…

SOMEDAY PROJECTS...

Then there are the “Someday Projects” – stuff that I have figures for but don’t really have a desire to play much right now and therefore they are not priorities… but I’d still like to get to them someday…

I have most of the armies for a 1066 campaign. The Vikings and Anglo-Danish are painted, the rest are not.

I also have a pile of old 25mm RAFM “Successor” figures that one day I’d like to paint up and use for DBA

I also have a few 15mm fantasy armies for Hordes of the Things that I could finish painting up…. And I also just bought a pile of 28mm elves I thought I’d paint and base up for Hordes – because having them in one scale just isn’t enough…. Hey they were a killer deal! 75% off!? I couldn’t even cast them for that cheap!

Warhammer Ancient Battles

Because having it in one scale isn’t enough… I have piles of Vikings, Saxons, Scotts and Irish…. Some painted, many not. I have plenty enough of the first two for WAB armies. If I did a generic Dark Age spear men I could finish out the other two with those… I have this silly idea that I’d base enough of them on 60mm wide bases so I cold also potentially use them for DBA…

Flames of War

I still have loads of stuff to paint for FoW and no desire to play let alone paint them… I have enough desert rat infantry for a second company, a full Fallschirmjager Company, piles of early war german tanks and trucks and horse carts and limbers to finish up, the Trucks for my LRDG patrol , and a dozen tanks for my DAK (6 Pzr III, 6 Pzr II)

AK-47 (20mm)

I have two armies painted and ready to go. I also have enough metal figures for two or three more armies…. Wish I had the time… but I don’t…

20mm WW2

Loads of them kicking around, no desire to paint. Not sure what I’m going to use them for either. Originally they were singly based, most have been rebased for Crossfire. But as that’s fallen out of favor… maybe I should jsut try to sell it...

20mm Vietnam

I have an entire battalion of US infantry (three stands = one platoon) and about half as many VC. I have a pile more VC/NVA to paint. I’ve used them for a crossfire-ish game, but haven’t played since Hero’s Gambit 2005.

28mm Vietnam

I have all of my Americans and most of the VC painted (a full-strength platoon+ of each). I have enough terrain for a good game. What I have yet to do is a platoon of NVA/PAVN and some VC or NVA support weapons… I also have an American tank and APC in varying stages of being painted…

Micro-sci-fi

I have Dirtside II. Haven’t played it in YEARS. Don’t remember much about it but I have some hazy memories of it being a fun game that I’d like to try again someday. Hopefully absence hasn’t made the heart grow fonder – I just bought a bunch of old battletech stuff from a 75% off bargain bin hoping that I might get around to painting and using them someday…

28mm Sci-fi and Super-heroes

I did pick up the Savage Worlds Sci-fi toolkits. Then I bought an odd assortment of Void from the aforementioned 75% off bargain bin… so I really ought to paint those up someday and roll some Savage Sci-fi into the mix on Savage Sundays.. I’m sure there’s also some Superfigs still kicking around needing to be painted…

Seven Year War 25mm

Playing Bob’s Germantown game last weekend has got me kind of interested in trying his Two for Tea rules with some of these old 25mm SYW figures I have. I might want to rebase some, and I have a couple regiments of both British and French that need finishing…

All right that’s enough for now… dang if anyone actually reads through all of this I’ll be amazed… You deserve a medal… I don’t have any medals to give out so post a comment below and I’ll give you two extra bennies next time we play Savage Worlds or something… Cheers!

Crowns in the Gutter analyzes the Great War strategic decisions, campaigns, weapons, tactical innovations, and other factors. For example, the book looks at how Germany's unrestricted submarine warfare may have hurt Germany more than Great Britain. The book also provides some interesting speculation on how the Central Powers might have won the war in 1918. Ted Raicer. Est. retail: $35 (Est. Pledge $28).